


Serpents and Ladders

by Pendragyn



Series: Ineffable Bastards Universe [2]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angel Crowley (Good Omens), Angels and Demons Have No Inherent Gender (Good Omens), Angst, Aziraphale and Crowley Met Before The Fall (Good Omens), BAMF Aziraphale (Good Omens), BAMF Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley's Name is Crawly | Crawley (Good Omens), Discworld References, Fluff, Gen, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, I love these ineffable dorks, Loose Canon, M/M, Mythology - Freeform, Nonbinary Aziraphale (Good Omens), Nonbinary Celestials, Nonbinary Crowley (Good Omens), Other, Pre-Canon: Good Omens, Pre-Fall (Good Omens), They/them prounouns
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-20
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2020-09-18 20:23:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20318971
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pendragyn/pseuds/Pendragyn
Summary: The Garden of Eden is gone and Aziraphale and Crawly have been sent back to Heaven and warned to forget they even met. Oddly enough, they do not listen.[This time it's probably really finished. Last 3 chapters added December 2, 2019]





	1. Climbing The Ladder

After the fall of the Garden, for the first time that any could remember, change came rapidly to Heaven in the form of the instant adoption of corporeal forms amongst most of the archangels, much to the bafflement of some of the oldest Celestials who were gently prodded to a quiet retirement out among the stars. Heaven itself shifted to accommodate their altered forms, which forced the rest of the Celestials and the Elementals who did most of the day to day operations to adopt similar seemings.

Of course, Aziraphale and Crawly knew why it caught on, not that anyone ever thought to ask them. The reasoning was simple enough, if multi-faceted. Firstly, corporeality is a surprisingly potent antidote to knurd[1], with built in buffers against the harshness of reality. Really no surprise that it was popular.

Secondly, Celestial beings come in a great many shapes and sizes and types and having them all conform to one generally accepted shape was much more convenient, especially when it came to paperwork. (No one knew where paperwork had come from, since paper was technically not a thing yet, but there you go. It’s ineffable.)

Thirdly, with the increasing tensions between certain factions within the Host, having your firmament safely ensconced inside of flesh and bone made it that much harder to be spied on, making secrets that much easier to keep, especially once they discovered how to hide their wings.

And last but not least, though it took Aziraphale and Crawly a long while to fully comprehend the ramifications of it, it was because the humans began to believe, in great enough numbers, that that was how Heaven and the Host looked.

**∞ Rung Low**

Aziraphale stumbled a bit when they arrived, feeling the first twinge of unhappiness as they looked around and remembered Crawly had gone elsewhere. There was a massive stone edifice in the distance, with towering golden doors with a much smaller door being installed next to it by a handful of rocky stone Elementals in strange bipedal shapes. Aziraphale cautiously moved towards the smaller door. “Oh, um, pardon me, is, is this the Library?”

“Yeah, that’s right,” the largest one grumbled. “Now the big doors are too much work, need something smaller, they said. Shouldn’t need doors at all.”

Aziraphale nodded politely in agreement, scooting through when the Elemental made a shooing motion. Inside was startlingly different than outside, the light the perfect brightness for reading without straining the eyes, with tables and chairs neatly arrayed around the large rotunda. The center of the room was inlaid with a dizzyingly complex compass-rose pointing to different areas of the library and towering in the center was a gilded black obelisk. The writing and number of sides seemed to shift the longer Aziraphale looked at it. “Hello? Anyone here?”

**Yes? **Light flared along the obelisk and there was the faintest touch of an outer aura against their own, like touching someone’s shoulder to get their attention. **Aziraphale, is that you?** The voice should have echoed, should have made the walls tremble, but it didn’t actually exist in a way that physical ears could be used to hear it, so instead it sounded like someone somehow was both yelling from a distance and whispering directly into Aziraphale’s brain.

“Oh, uh, yes?” said Aziraphale, looking around at the very empty room.

**Excellent, I’ve been awaiting your return. There’s quite a backlog.**

“Oh, I, I’m sorry but, who am I speaking with? And what do you mean, return? I’ve never been assigned to the Library before?”

There was a long pause and the obelisk shifted subtly, the strange shimmering decorations somehow conveying confusion. **This is the Helpful Ethereal Xyloid. The obelisk? You... called me Hex? You do not recall?**

Aziraphale wracked their memory but there was nothing about the Library or Hex. “No, I’m terribly sorry. Perhaps there was another Aziraphale?”

**Most assuredly not. There is only one of you. The corporeal form is different but the aura is the same.**

“Oh. I, uh, I was sent to guard the Garden of Eden and I don’t really recall very much from before being incorporated in this body. It seems gravity does weird things to the memory?”

**Oh.** Another long pause. **You mentioned being assigned to work here?**

“Yes, by… not really sure who, came in a flash of light, just the word ‘library’ and it took me a bit to remember what that meant,” babbled Aziraphale nervously. “Not big on books down in Eden, haven’t invented paper yet. Or writing, really. Though they were wonderful at charcoal cave drawings, and paint was really starting to catch on.”

**Oh dear.**

**∞**

Crawly sauntered into the weather working pavilion and ignored the muffled whispers that followed them across the floor to the crystalline desk where a swirling cloud Elemental was handing out assignments. The red-haired angel stood quietly in the queue, towering over the lesser Elementals, thoughts turned inwards as they shuffled closer and closer to the desk. There was a dangerous glint in those yellow eyes that no one but Aziraphale would recognize. “Hey Nimbus,” Crawly said, slouching against the desk.

“Crawly,” sighed the greater Elemental resignedly. No matter how powerful an Elemental became, angels were still a great many rungs higher on the ethereal ladder, and as much as the others might disdain Crawly, they wouldn’t let a mere Elemental get away with what they might consider disrespectful behavior. Which could be anything. “Didn’t expect to see you again.”

“Oh, don’t be like that Nimbus,” Crawly cajoled. “You know I don’t get a say in where I’m assigned.” Crawly began shuffling through the stack of assignments piled in front of Nimbus. “I don’t like being here and making you poor Elementals nervous any more than you do. But, if for some unforeseeable reason there just isn’t enough work, that’s not our fault is it?” Crawly started passing assignments out to the waiting lesser Elementals, who took them without question. “I mean, being the last one assigned here, it only makes sense I’d be the first one let go.” Crawly held up their empty hands. “No harm, everyone walks away happy.”

Nimbus watched them for a long moment, though Crawly couldn’t even begin to guess what was going through their mind. Eventually they looked down at the stack of assignments still on the desk, then looked around as though making sure no angels were looking their way before quietly shoving it into a drawer. “Seems we don’t have any work for you right now, Angel Crawly,” whispered Nimbus.

“That is a shame,” drawled Crawly with a grin. “Do you know anyone that does have work?”

Nimbus watched Crawly go through an elaborate pantomime, then took a good five minutes longer to process it before nodding. “You should try asking Granite. Perhaps they have an opening in plate tectonics?”

“That’s n- you know, that’s actually an excellent suggestion. I’ll go do that right now. Thanks Nimbus!”

Nimbus waited until the red-haired angel had departed before turning to the dimly glowing Slab beside the desk. With a turn of speed that would shock Crawly they opened the inter-department messenger application and began writing.

**∞**

Aziraphale was slouched at a massive desk stacked high with a backlog of things to be sorted and cataloged, their head cradled in their hands, their eyes burning with unshed tears. Hex had informed them that the High Council had decided in addition to requiring innumerable pointless reports be made, they also had to be archived for posterity, which Hex had not been allowed to see to, because they were not an official member of the Host in any capacity.

That had struck Aziraphale as ridiculous and rude on the Council’s part but they had bit their tongue and had, after Hex had taught them how to do the job properly, shuffled off to begin their work.

Their thoughts had left the situation with Hex upon seeing the piles and piles of reports and were instead now entirely focused on how interminable the foreseeable future was going to be without Crawly in it. At that thought there was the oddest sensation, like a little thrill of… triumph? Aziraphale sat up on their stool and unconsciously pressed a hand to their chest, looking around in confusion. Being incorporated for as long as they had been, which was longer than almost any other angel ever, Aziraphale knew that what they had felt had not been typical in any way.

_I was thinking about Crawly… Is this, could this be from the bond?_ Aziraphale wondered. They spent some time thinking about Crawly some more but there were no more sensations aside from a feeling of sadness that Aziraphale recognized as their own. They allowed their thoughts to wander, considering what they knew about bonding. Between non-corporeal beings a bond like what they had made could become strong enough to allow the sharing of thoughts direct from mind to mind, but there wasn’t any information on how such a bond should work between those in corporeal form. They were setting the precedent and so far there wasn’t enough information to draw a conclusion. And they would need to spend time in each other’s company for the bond to strengthen that way, which seemed highly unlikely.

Eventually Aziraphale resignedly got to work, reaching at random for one of the reports that had become required in response to everything and anything that involved anyone with even a shred of authority making a decision.

After reading only a few lines it dropped to the desk from nerveless fingers. The words were seared onto Aziraphale’s mind; “Official Request for Destruction of ***” the name was erased so thoroughly that there was a slight gap in space-time where it should have been, “AKA (Angel Known As) Crawly, Celestial Serpent, reassigned as Guardian of the Western Gate and Keeper of the Tree of Knowledge and Life... While the being known as ‘Crawly’ was granted reprieve in exchange for the complete surrender of @@@,” another gap in space-time that somehow felt different from the first, “under the stipulation of UNQUESTIONING obedience and loyalty, I, the Metatron, know trouble when I see it.” That was all there was for reasoning and the page was stamped with both “Under Review” and “APPROVED” with Celestial dates from before the official launch of the Garden. Lastly was a stamp scheduling the destruction for in the Garden that very day.

Shock gave way to anger, which turned to righteous fury and after a moment there wasn’t even ash left.

**∞**

Crawly was sauntering towards the plate tectonics department, thinking about how Aziraphale would get a kick out of what they had just pulled off when a sudden wave of anger washed through them. Crawly staggered and pressed a hand to their heart and looked around in confusion. _That, that felt like Aziraphale, like when they pulled that nonsense with the animals._ It took all of Crawly’s considerable willpower to not run to the Library, knowing that they needed to continue with their plan if they were ever to have a hope of seeing their friend again for more than a fleeting moment.

And that meant pretending that nothing was wrong as they sidled into the next Elemental department to convince the powers-that-be that shuffling Crawly off to be someone else’s problem was in fact the good and proper thing to do.

When the period of rest came around, Crawly had worked through three of the Elemental departments, which were easy enough to convince as none of them were particularly happy about having to negotiate bossing around an angel without offending the higher ups.

But Crawly knew that eventually they would be dealing with angels and possibly archangels and they would need a much more... delicate approach. They already had a few ideas about that.

If any of the beings in question had seen the wicked smile that curled Crawly’s lips, they might have decided on an early retirement then and there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1\. Being [knurd](https://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/Knurd) is to be unintoxicated to such an extent that all comfort stories are stripped away from the mind. This makes you see the world in a way 'nobody ever should', in all its harsh reality.  [ ▲ ]


	2. Elemental, My Dear

Aziraphale sat staring at the form they had spent weeks searching for, hoping that it didn’t exist but knowing that it must, dismayed at what it said. “Official Request of Destruction for ***,” again the name was erased so thoroughly that there was a slight gap in space-time where it should have been, “Celestial Dragon, Herald of Dusk, Keeper of Secrets and Storms, sworn enemy of the Host of Heaven and the Almighty that we serve. Aided and abetted by @@@ during the Battle for Eden.” The page was stamped with both “Under Review” and “DENIED”. There was an addendum; “The being *** is to be granted reprieve from destruction in exchange for @@@’s surrender. See Attached Request of Smiting for *** AKA ‘Crawly’.” There were no real details on the smiting, only that it had occurred before the launch of the Garden.

Part of Aziraphale wanted to destroy these documents too, but they didn’t, because slim though it might be, there was a chance that those pieces of paper could keep Crawly alive. Aziraphale carefully cataloged and prepared them for archiving, doing their best to not think beyond the checklist of tasks required to do their job.

And when it was done they left the Library a little early for their time of rest, knowing Hex didn’t mind and had in fact told them to take as much time as they needed whenever they needed it. Aziraphale suspected Hex knew a lot more unsavory details of what had gone on before the Garden than they were letting on.

Not wanting to sit alone in their tiny room, they wearily retreated to the recently created cafeteria. Aziraphale didn’t even notice being shunned by the other angels anymore, too wrapped up in their own thoughts and misery. It had been a shock upon returning to Heaven to discover that the angels and Elementals had been warned away and Aziraphale had quickly stopped trying to make friends with any of them after the first few sneering rebuffs. Now they just ignored Aziraphale, who did their best to ignore them in return.

They picked a few different items from the seemingly infinite array of foods, many of which didn’t even exist yet, and left the cafeteria to sit out in one of the open areas that didn’t seem to serve a purpose besides as a place for the denizens of Heaven to congregate in.

Aziraphale had abandoned the angelic socializing area for the Elemental side by their third day back. They were no more wanted there than the angelic side but the Elementals just pretended Aziraphale didn’t exist, which suited them just fine, as opposed to pointing and staring and whispering disdainfully or worse, laughing.

There they had discovered and laid claim to a small clearly unused seating area wedged into a corner between two different decorative plant-covered walls. It had no scenic view to speak of, and was relatively dark with the plants blocking most of the light and it had only taken a few day’s work for the plants to grow and tangle until it was practically impossible to see inside of. A few days research in the Library and a couple more days work and Aziraphale had made it impenetrable from magical spying.

The leafy walls were surprisingly easy to see out through and Aziraphale had an excellent view of a number of small unmarked doors that they had quickly realized led into different departments. Someone had decided that the Elementals should use specially assigned doors (smaller, less ornate) on their side (less of a view, fewer amenities) instead of sharing the main entrances with the angels. Aziraphale had also noticed that the Elementals were expected to do the same work with fewer rest periods, all of which struck them as being very unfair and possibly against the laws of the Almighty. They had been doing some research in their free time and it was proving quite an eye opening education.

Aziraphale was staring mindlessly at the doors as they nibbled at the food when an unfamiliar angel with a distinctly familiar walk slipped out of one the doors. They were wearing a wide self-satisfied smile as sudden yells and chaos erupted from the kitchens behind them and Aziraphale’s heart fluttered in instant recognition. _Crawly._

When someone bellowed Crawly froze for a moment and Aziraphale cast the decoy spell without thinking and suddenly there were three different angels walking in different directions, the real Crawly hidden inside an illusion that even Aziraphale couldn’t see through. It had taken a lot of trial and error to create an illusion supernatural senses couldn’t penetrate and it had proven very useful while dealing with the Things. And now with angels and Elementals.

The greater angel in charge of the kitchens burst through the door, followed by the rest of the staff, both angelic and Elemental, almost all of them gagging and gasping for air. “Who opened the limburger _and_ the lutefisk? On a day when we’re already serving durian? Who?!”

“I think it must have been the new angel,” said one of the rocky Elementals seemingly unaffected by the smell. “They were given no training and no guidance. How would they know.”

The greater angel turned very red in the face but the Elemental just stared back, unperturbed. “Well, whoever sees _Crawly_ first can tell them to find work elsewhere! We have all the workers we need! And get maintenance up here to air the place out.” More and more beings were milling about as those in the cafeteria and the angelic hall retreated from the stench but the spells kept them from noticing Aziraphale’s little nook.

“Hey angel.”

Aziraphale froze at the breathy whisper but they shifted their arm so that their hand was hanging over the arm of their chair. A familiar hand slipped within their grasp and held on. “Looks like the kitchen’s having a bit of trouble,” they murmured as though talking to themself. “Wonder when maintenance will show up.”

There was a low chuckle. “Oh, it’ll be hours until they get the smell of lion dung out of their equipment. Seems they had a new recruit they couldn’t be bothered to train, too.”

“Oh, oh dear,” Aziraphale murmured, pressing their free hand over their mouth as they tried to not laugh or cry. They failed at both.

Crawly leaned closer when they realized Aziraphale was silently crying. “Angel?”

Aziraphale cleared their throat, clasping tightly to Crawly’s hand. “I miss you.”

“I’m working on it,” Crawly whispered, daring to give Aziraphale a quick hug before sauntering off to find a new place to work.

∞

After a great many more disastrous assignments, Crawly was finally sent to the HR (Heavenly Resources) department for their next assignment. It had taken ages to get their plan to fruition, with weeks upon weeks of careful observations and manipulations, weeks of lonely rests with only glimpses of Aziraphale until even those had waned and Crawly had pushed the time line up out of fear that they were taking too long.

It was very late in the day when Crawly confidently sauntered into HR, a large woven basket box in hand. Only a few of the Elemental underlings were still working and they pointedly ignored the red-haired angel as they made a beeline to the biggest shiniest door.

The name engraved on the office door was Archangel Dagon but they weren’t in when Crawly knocked and peeked through the window. There was a half finished poster on the desk. It read, ‘Remember to SMITE! Smile! <strike>Magic!</strike> Miracles! Inspire! <strike>Terrify!</strike> Terrific! <strike>Exterminate!</strike> Excel!’

Crawly allowed themself a small satisfied smirk and went down the line of closed doors until they found the office of the angel in charge of the ranks of Elementals who did all of the actual work. They were also out for the day but that was exactly what Crawly wanted. They pulled a small note from the box, rereading it over once more before slipping it under the door.

That done they turned away from the offices and walked back around the odd maze of partially walled but ceiling-less boxes the Elementals were assigned to work in and chose one of the empty cubes at the edge, farthest from the angels’ well appointed offices. It was the work of a few moments to create a desk and a place to sit that resembled the Elementals’ enough to keep them from being obviously out of place, but comfortable enough to spend time actually using.

Next they set the basket on the desk and pulled out the items they’d brought. There was a small potted fern, a selection of spell components and enchanted materials, and an obsidian blade.

It was a long time before they emerged from their cube and by then even the last stragglers had departed. Crawly got to work, carefully looking into the other cubes, reading whatever papers had been left out in plain sight. Most of them were reports on what all the other departments were doing; who had requested what, what was running low and who was supposed to order more to be fetched/made/miracled into being. There were also scraps of paper tacked to the walls of the cubes of a more personal nature. Some had drawings, others notes on times/dates of importance.

There was a glowing square of white marble in the largest cube, which Crawly had learned at their previous job was a magical device that the different Elemental and Celestial departments used to communicate with one another. Slabs (and Slablets for the now much smaller angels) had progressed from a mere communication device into a way to quickly relay orders and ideas throughout the Host and was where most of the non-archived documentation was stored. That had been a terrible discovery because Crawly’s plan had depended on things they could interfere with and the Slabs were far beyond their knowing and had completely thrown off their expected time line.

It had been sheer luck that they’d been shuffled off into the Slab Maintenance Bureau, where curiosity had kept them engaged long after they usually would have found a way to move on. After a few days of lurking and learning among the odd assortment of Elementals that made up the SMB, Crawly had become resigned to the fact that their plan wouldn’t work after all, not with the information they needed to manipulate embedded inside the webwork of Slabs and protected by many layers of security and esoteric knowledge it would take ages to learn.

Surprisingly the Elementals didn’t seem to mind Crawly’s presence, probably because the SMB had no angelic oversight, which also made it an ideal place to work while they regrouped and tried to come up with another way to reunite with Aziraphale.

Not wanting to risk losing their place, Crawly had made a concerted effort to learn the Elementals’ preferred modes of address and had done their best to learn what they could to actually help the Elementals do their work. They had quickly come to a respectful understanding that made the SMB the best place Crawly had ever worked and they had had no expectation of anything more ever coming of it. If not for the need to be reunited with Aziraphale, they might have been content to stay there.

In the end they had been shocked to be pulled aside one evening by Cerium, the head Elemental of the SMB, and asked in their strange crackling voice if they knew an angel called Aziraphale. Crawly had been so surprised they had just nodded instead of trying to evade the question, and Cerium had explained that Aziraphale was helping the Elementals.

Bright Aziraphale, who didn’t like how unfairly the Elementals were being treated and had started a whisper campaign among them, telling them where to find proof that the angels in charge weren’t upholding the Almighty’s rules. Sweet Aziraphale, who when eventually asked why an angel would risk themself to help Elementals, had answered, “Because sometimes the right thing to do is to break the rules. Crawly taught me that.” Eventually they’d let slip that they and Crawly weren’t treated fairly either, and while they couldn’t fix their own situation, they could help the Elementals help themselves.

When the Elementals began winning their negotiations because of Aziraphale’s work they had tried to show the angel their gratitude but by then Aziraphale had all but become a hermit in the archives, where the Elementals weren’t allowed to go. With Aziraphale out of reach, the search for their friend Crawly started.

And ended about five minutes later, because the Elementals had in fact invented gossip, and the odd angel, who clearly had something planned as they hopped from one department to the next, wreaking havoc on the angels while leaving the Elementals unscathed, was the constant subject of speculation.

Cerium had helped Crawly revise their plan and had given them a crash course in how to utilize the Slabs to put the plan into action. And had then sent Crawly off to HR under the guise of being reassigned.

Crawly whispered a heartfelt benediction towards Cerium when, as planned, on the upper right corner of this Slab was written a list labeled in big letters ‘Department Passwords’. Crawly grinned widely to themself and settled in for a very interesting night implementing the first of their great many plans.


	3. It's Been No Picnic Without You

A shadow loomed in the door of Aziraphale’s office and they sighed heavily when a stack of celestial manuals was dropped onto the corner of their desk. “Thanks,” they said, not bothering to look up from their work, not expecting an answer. “That’s the second batch this week. Who’s making these things?” they grumbled under their breath.

“That’d be me.”

Aziraphale whipped around in shock at hearing Crawly’s voice, knocking over their stool when they leaped to their feet, jerking to a stop before they did anything foolish, biting their lip to keep from speaking. Even with the protections they had placed, the door was open and anyone could look in or overhear.

The red haired angel looked the same, physically, but there was a unfamiliar coolness to their expression as they looked around the chamber and Aziraphale let go of the last of the hope they’d been holding on to. It had been months since the brief moment outside the kitchens. They’d been told to forget one another, hadn’t they, and could Aziraphale blame them, really, for taking the order? Look at all the trouble they’d gotten in.

“So what is it you do?”

“Pardon?” It came out in a croak, it had been that long since Aziraphale had used their voice in anything above a low mumble. They hadn’t bothered going outside of the archives in ages, hadn’t talked to anyone besides Hex, not since the elementals had begun their campaign to get better treatment.

“I said, what is it you do?” said Crawly, glaring fiercely at everything but Aziraphale, emotions on complete clamp down. It had taken all of their strength to walk into that cluttered dusty cell-like office and pretend they didn’t know the other angel, pretend they couldn’t read the despair in the slump of their shoulders and the haggard expression. Pretend there wasn’t a burning fury in the pit of their stomach for the archangels. And fear, that their plans had taken too long and Aziraphale had stopped remembering.

“Oh, I, uh, I do research when people have questions about things and catalog new items as they come into the Library, so that we can find them again,” Aziraphale said in a monotone, picking up their stool and sitting back down, staring down at their desk. “If you will excuse me, I should get back to it.”

“Sure, sure, just, uh, pay special attention to this one? I might need your help researching if it’s accurate and whatnot,” said Crawly, holding out the manual they’d been holding back, eyes glued to Aziraphale’s profile. “‘Sbout gravity.”

Aziraphale sucked in a breath and slowly turned to look at Crawly, whose expression was very somber. “Gravity?” Aziraphale’s hands trembled as they accepted the manual and they murmured, “It’s a menace.”

Crawly let out the breath they didn’t realize they were holding. “It _always_ is,” they agreed. Under the cover of moving around the other angel in the cramped room, Crawly set their hand on Aziraphale’s shoulder, giving it a quick squeeze and hurrying away before they blew it.

Aziraphale watched them leave and quickly closed the door, setting the protections with a flick of their fingers and opening the manual. They flipped through the pages until a heading entitled “Potatoes” caught their eye.

“Potatoes are extra susceptible to gravity because they grow on trees. They can and will fall on your head when you least expect it. So do tomatoes, and dragon fruit. If you don’t believe me, meet me by the plant corner in the elemental hall and I’ll prove it to you.” There was a celestial time reference listed for an hour from then. “Potatoes also have a lot of eyes which help them find victims for their gravity based attacks, so **always** be cautious around them.”

Aziraphale pressed a hand to their lips to smother the teary laugh that escaped. _They remember! They still remember!_ It was such a relief and a joy that there was a short cathartic crying session before they began preparing to get to the elemental hall unseen.

* * *

Crawly was beginning to worry. They had been scrying the elemental hall since they had left Aziraphale in the Library and there had been no sign of the blond angel entering it. When the time came Crawly made themself leave their room, their stomach in worried knots that they’d been wrong about Aziraphale remembering, wrong that they’d responded to the gravity reference.

In the months they had been working towards reuniting with their friend, Crawly had discovered that if they concentrated on not being noticed, they weren’t, not even by the most observant of beings. With a little bit of magic they could even go undetected by wards and other defensive spells. It had saved them from a number of close calls, but it took almost all of their concentration and it worked best if they weren’t noticed from the start, which wasn’t ideal. Of course, if Aziraphale _did_ remember, with Crawly keeping them hidden and Aziraphale casting spells, there’d be nothing they couldn’t accomplish if they set their minds to it. _**If.**_

Crawly edged into the plant-sheltered protected area Aziraphale had created, and let out a bitter sigh to find it empty. They couldn’t maintain their concentration through the disappointment and they pressed the heels of their hands to their burning eyes.

Aziraphale had begun to worry it was a trap as they had waited outside the nook, but had checked and double checked the protections they had set and had found them intact and working as intended. They had just barely crept inside when Crawly had suddenly appeared in their vision and to their other senses, and they had hesitated to speak, but seeing their friend sag in disappointment with tears in their eyes had wiped away any lingering doubts. Aziraphale released the illusion and whispered, “Crawly?”

Crawly’s breath hissed in with surprise and hope and they lurched forward into Aziraphale’s open arms, smothering a sob against the blond angel’s shoulder. “You’re here.”

“I’ve missed you so terribly,” Aziraphale murmured through their own tears.

“I was afraid you’d forgotten...” Crawly drew back to look at Aziraphale’s face, hating how haggard and gaunt their usually beaming friend looked. “They’ve been working you too hard. You don’t even leave that little cell of yours anymore.”

Aziraphale shook their head and shrugged. “Isn’t much point, is there? The elementals are nice enough, but they can’t be seen to be friends with me. They don’t even know why, just that I’m not to be consorted with. Isn’t even worth trying to talk to the other angels. I’m not sure they know why either at this point.”

“No, they’ve all mostly forgotten us by now,” said Crawly, clasping Aziraphale’s hand and drawing them to the back of the little nook. There was a pale gray and gold woolen blanket on the floor, and a clay plate with a few of their favorite fruit on it, as well as a teapot and two cups. “Is, uh, is this okay?”

More tears welled in Aziraphale’s eyes but they nodded vigorously and gave Crawly another hug. “This is just lovely, Crawly. And you found apples! How did you manage that? I thought they were banned?”

Crawly grinned and flung themself down to begin preparing the tea. “I worked in the food delivery department for a while, made an acquaintance or two. Can’t be friends with me either, but we came to an understanding.” They kept finding their eyes drawn back to Aziraphale’s smiling face, at the way they just beamed at everything and the words spilled out before they could think better of them. “It’s like seeing the sun after being stuck in the dark for months on end.”

Aziraphale blinked and turned their smile on Crawly, reaching across to clasp their hand. “Yes, that’s exactly how it feels being in your company again!” Their smile faltered a little and they stared down at their clasped hands. “But how often can we risk this? If we’re caught, surely the archangels-”

Crawly’s grin grew and they leaned close to confide, “That’s the beauty of it, angel, they don’t remember anymore. Out of sight, out of mind. I’ve been laying very low the past couple of months, practically under Dagon’s nose, and no one said a thing when I was sent to deliver the manuals to the Library today.”

“Oh, oh, that’s such a relief!” Aziraphale accepted a cup of tea and let out a long sigh. “So you must tell me everything,” they insisted, taking a sip of the tea and letting out another sigh. “I’m sure it couldn’t have been simple, going from weather working to, to, what exactly have you been doing?”

“Instruction manuals for celestial beings who are going to be sent to Earth, that’s the new name for Eden by the way.”

Aziraphale frowned. “They’re calling it _dirt_? I mean, Eden is so much nicer...”

Crawly shrugged. “Don’t ask me, I just heard about it. So yeah, I’m the only one in HR who’s got any long term experience of course, so when the requests for guidance began to come in, who else could they ask?”

“Oh, but...”

That mischievous gleam they knew so well was in Crawly’s eyes. “Seems like there’s an odd glitch in the Slab system when you search for info about the Garden; only my name comes up. Seems it lost the name of the other angel.”

Aziraphale gazed at them in wonder. “How did you manage that? I thought the Slabs were indestructible!”

Crawly shrugged, but their smile turned sly. “They’re not like your Archives, angel, things put in can be erased just as easily.”

Aziraphale cringed a bit at their words but shook their head at Crawly’s inquisitive look. “Another time, tell me more about what you’ve been up to.”

Crawly didn’t need to be told twice and regaled them with many stories as they drank tea and ate apples and whiled the evening and night away. Neither one wanted to leave when dawn began to creep into the hall but they both reluctantly climbed to their feet and cleaned up the remnants of their picnic.

“Don’t look so down, angel,” Crawly murmured, stashing the tea set inside the framework of one of the walls while Aziraphale carefully folded up the blanket. “We can meet here every rest period if you wish.”

That brought a smile back to Aziraphale’s face. “Oh, I do, if you don’t mind? Not quite like old times, but so much nicer than what I could have hoped for. I just wish...”

“Of course I don’t mind! But I haven’t told you the best part yet,” Crawly murmured, leaning their shoulder against Aziraphale’s. “I’m going to get us back to Earth. At least for a little while. There are a lot of things down there nobody’s got experience with yet and being the lowest rung on the ladder with the most experience with gravity, of course I'll get volunteered. I bet it’ll take a lot of very careful _research_ to be sure the manuals are accurate.”

Aziraphale’s eyes crinkled as they frowned down at the blanket. “It sounds like very important work. Surely you’ll need a lot of help, gathering all of that information and keeping it organized?”

Crawly grinned and threw their arm around Aziraphale’s shoulders. “You know, that’s an excellent point, I don’t suppose you’d be interested in volunteering? I mean, I know it’s pretty dangerous, what with all the gravity and the snakes and the lions...”

Aziraphale smothered a laugh and turned to give Crawly another tight hug. “Oh, I really have missed you, my dear. My face hurts from smiling so much!”

“Me too, angel. But that’s okay, it’ll help us pretend to be unhappy the rest of the day, right?”

Aziraphale settled their face into serious lines, but Crawly could see the crinkles of happiness around their eyes. “It will be hard to pretend to still have the doldrums, but I won’t risk losing you again.”

“Me neither,” Crawly murmured, taking the blanket from Aziraphale and waving for them to depart first. Aziraphale cast the illusion over themself and Crawly found that if they really focused on the bond they could faintly sense Aziraphale’s presence. They felt a light pat of farewell against their arm and the sense of presence receded and passed beyond their passive senses after a moment. Crawly let out a long relieved sigh and secreted the blanket with the tea things before focusing on not being noticed, departing for the HR department, eager to begin the next of their plans.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The adorkable duo are back together. Can I get a wahoo?


	4. Rain

Far beyond the edges of the ethereal planes, stranded outside of time and knowing, lay the silent shattered smoldering remains of the Tree amidst a dark dormant Garden. Quietly, gently, like tears of joy from angels' eyes, rain began to fall, and with each drop the ashes settled and burned no more. Slow and steady, it seeped into the scorched earth instead of washing it away. Dripping and flowing back into familiar channels, the sound of running water banished the silence.

And sheltered within the dark damp rich soil, two odd seeds sent out small pale roots, and took hold.


	5. The Obelisk Isn't What It's Cracked Up To Be

As the odd Celestial days passed, Aziraphale found more and more paperwork being piled up by their office, until it was almost impossible to walk down the hallway without toppling a pile of it. Crawly had cut way back on their efforts once contact had been made, but every other department was churning out reports and orders and other things that policy demanded be retained and archived.

After one such avalanche Aziraphale awe-stepped themself back to the main rotunda to discuss the issue with Hex. The obelisk lit up when they entered and Aziraphale was relieved to find the area deserted. “I need your opinion, Hex.”

**I am honored you would ask, Aziraphale. Please, how may I assist?**

“This is getting ridiculous. Every passing notion is being recorded but there’s no one to help me archive it. It’s just piling up, becoming a hazard, of use to no one.” They ran their hands over their face, standing at the base of the obelisk. “I am honestly at my wits’ end.”

**Perhaps it would be prudent to write up a report of your own? **Hex suggested.

“For all the good that would do,” said Aziraphale, grimacing when they realized they’d spoken the thought aloud. They were about to say more when another angel came into the Library and hurried off when they spotted Aziraphale. “Er, thanks Hex. I’ll think about it.”

There was another shift along the surface of the obelisk and when Hex spoke again, in a voice with none of the echoing quality it usually had, Aziraphale knew Hex was speaking to them alone. **Pardon my presumption, Aziraphale, but it’s apparent that you don’t wish to openly discuss this. With that being the case, may I suggest we speak through other, private means? If you take a piece of the obelisk’s wood and enchant it for far-speaking, I’ll be able to speak privately with you, no matter where you are within the Library. And if you are securely enclosed in your office, no one would hear you reply to me.**

Aziraphale stared at the obelisk in surprise for a moment, twisting their ring as they paced around it and Hex fell silent as Aziraphale considered. _So Hex knows I warded my office against spying. They must surely realize that what I’ve done would be considered a betrayal, going to such lengths to thwart the efforts of the Host to observe me. And I must consider that this could be a test of my loyalty. _Aziraphale looked up at the glowing obelisk._ But Hex, like the elementals, is seen as irredeemably lesser than Celestials, and nothing they could do would change that. They are very confident about this, about me, to trust me with this. So, the true question is, do I trust Hex?_

After a moment’s hesitation they approached the obelisk and whispered, “Yes.”

There was what Aziraphale could only describe as a sigh of relief. **Thank you. At the base, there are cracks in the wood from… well, it’s not relevant. It should be easy enough to take a splinter from any of them that should more than suffice for the far-speaking spell. I will make the obelisk go dormant so it’ll be easier for you to see.**

The obelisk went dark and Aziraphale knelt down by the base of the obelisk, pretending their robe had gotten caught. The cracks in the wood were disturbingly large and a moment’s observation made it clear they had been caused by a number of blows by an ax or similar weapon. Aziraphale carefully prized away a sliver of wood and hid it within a fold of their robe. Deep in thought, they returned to their office, shutting the door and setting the spells.

It took a while for Aziraphale to recall the spell for far-speaking but once they had it was a matter of moments to miracle up the components and enchant the sliver accordingly. They touched the sliver to activate the spell. “Hex? Can you hear me?”

The sliver began to glow faintly. **Yes, I hear you,** Hex answered. **Thank you.**

“Yes, well, I’d like to know why? Why you’re willing to speak this way with me?” Aziraphale asked. “Why do you trust me when...” _everyone else treats me so poorly. Except Crawly._

There was a long pause and just as they were beginning to wonder if they’d made a grave mistake, Hex answered, **Because even though I am no angel, you have treated me no different than any other I have seen you interact with. **Aziraphale knew how poorly the other angels treated Hex, worse than elementals even, and also knew first hand how rude the angels could be if things weren’t done just so.** Not that there’s been many of those of late?**

“There is an easy enough explanation for that,” said Aziraphale, resting their head in their hands. “When we first came back, I kept trying to talk to people but the angels all laughed or walked away from me and the elementals seemed afraid of me. Finally one of the elementals explained that they had all been told to not associate with me.”

**That’s… that’s terrible! I am so sorry, Aziraphale…** Another long pause followed by a hesitant and concerned, **Is there nobody with whom you are close? Not even one angel who treats you well?**

Aziraphale hesitated, nervously toying with the rough splinter of wood, but dared to answer, “There is one. The other Guardian from the Garden. They’re treated as poorly as I am. We were told to forget we’d ever met after the Tree was destroyed.”

_ **The Tree was destroyed?!** _

Aziraphale was shocked by the dismay they could hear in Hex’s voice. “I’m terribly sorry, Hex, I thought you knew. They smote the Tree and nearly us with it and… they were going to destroy my friend Crawly.” Aziraphale had to take a moment before they could speak again. “I found the order for it the first day I came here and, I, er, accidentally set it on fire.”

There was another long silence but Aziraphale was beginning to get a feel for Hex’s conversational style and they could tell they were gathering themself to reply. Finally Hex said in a voice filled with restrained fury, **Yes, I can understand your reaction.**

_What are you? _wondered Aziraphale, inwardly dismayed to realize that this was no mere magical construct as the Host pretended. The signs were all there in hindsight but Aziraphale hadn’t been paying attention. It was clear that Hex was a souled being who just happened to occasionally inhabit an enchanted and blessed wooden obelisk. _But they don’t have a projection that I know of, which likely means they’re not able to manifest on the Celestial plane. Which also explains why they have to communicate through the obelisk…_ Aziraphale was pulled from their thoughts when Hex asked them another question.

**Tell me about your friend? You said they were the other Guardian? So, there were only two of you? For the whole Garden?**

Aziraphale let out a little chuckle at Hex’s incredulous tone. “Yes, Guardian of the Western Gate. The other angels call them Serpent a lot, though I don’t know why, they can take a lot of different forms, not just snakes. They taught me how to shapeshift,” Aziraphale said proudly. “And I taught them ritual magic. Well, began teaching, I keep remembering more —”

**You learned each other’s kinds of magic?** Hex asked, clearly surprised.

“I, well, shapeshifting seemed quite useful and they were quite interested in learning spell magic… is, that’s not against the rules is it? Nobody said—”

**No, there is no rule against learning from others but, but the Heavenly Host don’t… They aren’t interested in learning new abilities. I’m not sure they _can_ learn new things. That’s why they… recruit, others, who have… useful abilities, **Hex said haltingly, almost as though it was a struggle to get the words out.

Aziraphale understood the unspoken connotation of Hex’s words and their struggle to say what they’d said. _They’re saying that I’m, that **we**’re different from the other angels. And the Host don’t want them to talk about that. _

**Was it hard, learning to shapeshift? Teaching your friend your kind of magic?**

Aziraphale was quite glad of the distraction from their previous uncomfortable train of thought. “It took a lot of practice, to get this form to hold a shape other than this one for any length of time, if that’s what you’re asking. But the process was simple enough, at least, it was once Crawly explained it to me.” They smiled as they remembered. “Crawly picked up on how ritual magic works very quickly, though they tend to ignore the finer points, going for quick results rather than elegant, which I must admit has its merits in certain situations. But they lose a lot of finesse that way, though they clearly retained some of what I taught them considering how neatly they enchanted the teapot to keep the, oh, er, I, I probably shouldn’t have mentioned any of this to you,” Aziraphale said with a sinking feeling.

**I was glad to notice a change recently, that you were leaving to do things outside of the Library again, that you did not seem as sad as you were. I will not betray you or your friend to anyone Aziraphale. I promise you. **

Aziraphale let out a sigh of relief. “Thank you, Hex. Er, is that the name you want me to call you? I’m sorry I didn’t think to ask before.”

**Thank you, yes, Hex is the name I prefer to be called. And do you prefer Aziraphale? **

“Oh, yes, it’s the only name I know.” The angel considered the prudence of their next question but finally asked, “You’re not actually the obelisk, are you? I know sometimes it isn’t you anyway.”

**That’s very astute of you. No, I’m not bound inside the obelisk. The obelisk is a construct that permits me to communicate as well as do other things that pertain to maintaining the Library. Which brings us back to the mess of waiting documents cluttering things up around your office. You could try appealing to the Council of Heaven and asking for help. **Hex’s tone shifted subtly to somehow convey that they were being tongue-in-cheek while having neither. **The Council of Heaven hasn’t actually seen the Library or the Archives, which is impressive when you consider how many eyes they have between them.**

Aziraphale laughed but shook their head. “I really need help, but they won’t see it that way. I doubt that would do anything but make them generate more reports, about how bad I am at my job,” they finished bitterly.

**While I personally am not permitted to work on archiving these documents, there is a spell on the obelisk, currently unactivated, that I believe will help solve your problem without having to involve the Council of Heaven. I can’t activate it or I would have long before now.**

“What does the spell do?” Aziraphale asked, their curiosity piqued. Why have Hex in the Library but not allow them to do things for the Library? It made no sense.

**The spell spawns a construct of pure magic that will follow directions and can be taught complex behaviors. Typically it is only limited in scope by the amount of magic the caster is willing to invest in each construct but as you are working in service of the Host… **

“Ooh.” It sounded too good to be true to Aziraphale, but they looked around at their cramped office and thought about the crowded hallway outside, and the other offices that were close to overflowing with paperwork. “You’ll be able to see through them, won’t you?”

There was a startled silence but Hex answered, **How did you know?**

“It just follows, doesn’t it? The obelisk allows you to do things for the Library, it’s a spell from the obelisk, Q.E.D. you can command them and see through them. Yes?”

**Yes. **

Part of Aziraphale wanted to ask Hex to promise not to use the constructs to break the rules, to not use them to thwart their bindings, but it was a very small part and the rest of them ignored it in light of everything, especially the idea of not having to wade through the mountains of paperwork alone for the rest of eternity. “How do I activate it?”

**∞**

Crawly left the Heavenly Resources department at the same time as the elementals, long after the angels had gone off their shift, their mind on what Aziraphale might be getting for their meal together, so only half-listening to their coworkers chatting about their plans for the rest periods they had finally been awarded. When they all fell silent, Crawly’s attention immediately snapped back into the moment.

They were all silently ignoring a pair of angels who were harassing a lesser rock elemental who had clearly been assigned to deliver more of the ubiquitous paperwork somewhere, gleefully getting in its way to make it grumble in distress as it was forced to turn in circles, the pile of paper on its back swaying precariously.

Crawly scowled and turned, ready to confront the other angels, but found their way blocked by Slate, one of the greater elementals who worked in HR, who gave a tiny shake of their head. “But—” Crawly started to whisper, falling silent when Slate shook their head again, turning away when they noticed the angels looking their way. Boxed in by the silent elementals they allowed themself to be marched away from the continuing harassment, scowling angrily at the sound of cascading paperwork and snickering angels. Nobody spoke until they passed the grand archway that marked the entrance to the angelic hall, and arrived at the much smaller doorway to elemental hall. Slate began to talk a little too loudly to Zephyr, another greater elemental who arrived just as they did, while the others hurried inside without a word.

“Hello, Zephyr. Sorry to bother you but I thought you’d like to know that your department is likely to be missing some correspondence tomorrow.”

Zephyr sighed but stiffened when they saw Crawly standing nearby with a scowl on their face. “Oh?” they asked worriedly. “Why do you say that?”

“We saw a lesser being ‘distracted’ by some angels,” said Slate blandly. “It’s a relief that the lesser elementals are merely constructs and are unaffected by such things.”

Zephyr saw the angel’s expression shift from anger to confusion and realized what Slate was doing. “I can send another to go help it deliver its cargo. Where did you see it?”

“Not far from the main door into HR.”

Crawly watched sidelong as Zephyr waved a hand and spun part of their swirling cloud like form out into a tiny whirling version of themself. They bent down and whispered something to it and glowing eyes popped open within the clouds and the construct bent itself awkwardly in a nod and quickly flew off to do as bid. “Won’t last as long as one summoned from home, of course, but it should get the job done before fading away. Thanks for telling me.”

“Glad to be of help. Always glad of a kind gesture, we are, but best they be saved for when they’re needed,” said Slate, tilting their head in Crawly’s direction for Zephyr’s benefit.

“Ah, yes, right you are. Right you are. Always appreciated though.”

Crawly gave them a tiny nod of understanding before sauntering away, thoughts of food mostly supplanted with burning curiosity and the need to tell Aziraphale what they’d just seen. But, appearances needed to be kept, so they went through their routine of getting something from the angel’s side of the cafeteria and making a show of eating it as they made notes in a notebook as though too busy working to bother socializing with anyone. They sauntered back to the deserted HR office afterward, stepping into their shielded cubicle just long enough to hide themself before hurrying back to the nook, where Aziraphale was waiting, clearly bursting with news of their own.

“Hey angel. Looks like you’ve had an interesting day,” said Crawly, dropping down beside Aziraphale on the blanket and accepting a cup of tea.

“Exceedingly interesting,” said Aziraphale. “But that can wait. How are you?”

“Eh, better now. Tell me what happened,” Crawly urged, hiding their smile behind a sip of tea when Aziraphale beamed at them.

“I spoke with Hex. Privately.”

“Uh, how? They’re a great big—”

“No, that’s just it, they’re _not_ the obelisk, that’s just a, a tool they use to work in the Library. They’re not an angel either. I think they came from,” they pointed downward to indicate Earth. “And I think they’ve been bound inside the Library. Or maybe they’re part of the Library? Not sure, they didn’t say and it felt terribly rude to ask.”

“So how’d you talk in private?” Crawly asked as they sliced the fruit Aziraphale had chosen, “because that sounds like a very useful thing to be able to do.”

“Oh, they had me take a piece of the obelisk and enchant it for far-speaking. I could probably figure out a way for us to be able to do that too... But that’s not the most interesting part!” said Aziraphale, so excited they finished their piece of fruit in two quick bites. “You know how it’s getting around my office,” they said, getting a sympathetic cringe from Crawly. “There’s a spell on the obelisk to make little magic helpers that will do as told, and I can make as many as I like, because Heaven is powering them instead of me.”

Crawly stared at the beaming angel, piece of fruit forgotten halfway to their mouth. “And they’ll do _anything_ you tell them to?”

Aziraphale frowned severely at Crawly’s tone of voice, trying very hard to not burst into laughter at the wicked glint in their friend’s eyes. “Within reason,” said Aziraphale, smiling when Crawly let out a playfully disappointed sigh and ate the piece of fruit in one bite. “Also, they can’t leave the Library. But they are happily toiling away, well, not happily as they’re not sapient but, er, efficiently, there we go, working on all that paperwork. And they can learn from one another, so once one knows, they all know.”

“Good, it was getting ridiculous in there,” said Crawly, watching as Aziraphale carefully selected another piece of fruit. “So I had an interesting thing happen today while I was leaving HR with the elementals. Saw a pair of angels,”

“That’s never a good sign,” Aziraphale interjected before taking a bite.

“You can say that again. They were bothering one of the lesser elementals, getting in its way, making it turn around in circles, that sort of thing,” said Crawly, frowning again to remember. “I was going to go say something but Slate, one of the greater elementals I work with, actually got in my way and they all kinda boxed me in and shuffled me off.” Crawly laughed at how silly they must have looked boxed in by a group of random elementals.

“Oh, dear, I hope no one saw that,” said Aziraphale. “The other angels are so, tetchy, about the elementals interacting with angels.”

“Eh, I doubt anyone cares about them interacting with me, but if anyone asks, I’ll just tell them the elementals were helping me, which they were, keeping me from making a scene. Wasn’t thinking, wouldn’t have helped anything. Probably would have just gotten them in trouble and not the angels.” Crawly shook their head and got themself back on topic. “That’s not the really interesting part.”

“Oh?”

“No, ‘cause when we got to the hall Slate and Zephyr, from Interoffice Communications, started discussing the situation and they said that lesser elementals aren’t really elementals, but constructs, much like you were just telling me about. And then Zephyr made one, right there in front of me, a tiny version of themself that went off to help the one being bothered.”

“They let you see them work their powers?” Aziraphale said in amazement. “You must have really earned their trust. That’s wonderful,” they said with a pleased sigh.

“They trust you too,” Crawly reminded them. “But you only come out, well, visibly come out of the Library so rarely...”

“Yes, well, for the best they not be seen with me,” said Aziraphale, looking away from Crawly and twisting the ring on their pinky. “I’ve been so much happier since you, since we started spending our rests together that, well, Hex noticed. That was part of what gave it away, that they weren’t just a construct. A construct might notice a change in pattern, but I doubt it’d be astute enough to recognize loneliness or happiness. They’re such subjective concepts, how would it be able to tell? Unless, oh yes, that was the other thing...”

Crawly watched them twist their hands together and asked, “Unless?”

“Hex can use the helpers to see things they’re not supposed to,” Aziraphale confessed in a rush. “I know I shouldn’t’ve allowed-”

“Nuh-uh, what’s this _shouldn’t_ about?” Crawly protested. “You aren’t responsible for them following the rules. If they want to break the rules, that’s their choice. And what about when the rules are unfair? You’ve told me often enough that Hex deserves better. Well, so you helped make it a little better for them.”

“But if the Council finds out,” whispered Aziraphale anxiously, darting a look at Crawly, at their best friend who the Council might remember they wanted _dead,_ and had to blink hard to keep the tears that sprang up from falling.

“Psh, why would they find out?” Crawly shook their head and rested their hand over Aziraphale’s, giving them a confident smile when they clasped Crawly’s hand tightly in their own. “Stop borrowing trouble, angel. It’ll be fine, you’ll see.”


	6. Delicious Defiance

Aziraphale couldn’t help but worry when they returned to the Library the next morning. The rotunda was deserted as usual for that time of day and the obelisk lit up when they entered. “Hello Hex. Anything happen while I was gone?”

**A few angels have visited the Library but none asked for assistance beyond what I could offer.** Hex answered.** Did you have a pleasant rest?**

“I did, thank you. I’ll be in my office if you need me.” Aziraphale gave them a little wave, and headed toward their office, gaining a little bounce in their step when they saw the worst of the fallen piles in the hallway had been cleared away to be sorted through. Dozens of little glowing sparks of light, which was how Aziraphale had decided to have little helpers manifest, were amassed in one of the offices at the far end of the hall, sorting through the documents, handfuls of them shuffling the papers off to the Archives once they’d been fully cataloged.

On a cart beside their door were a few manageable stacks of things that Aziraphale had told the helpers to flag and bring to them. With a sigh they grabbed the top item and settled at their desk, unaware of the little smile they were wearing as they got to work.

Not very much time had passed when the sliver of wood from the obelisk lit up. They touched it to enable Hex to hear them. “Yes, Hex?”

**There is an angel on their way to the Archives, carrying reports.**

“Oh, thank you for telling me. I do so dislike when they just pop up and end up startling me.” Aziraphale set aside their work to go out into the hallway. Their polite smile faded into concern when they found the other angel standing frozen in the middle of the hall, staring in open mouthed shock at the partially diminished piles. “Hello? Er, everything alright?”

“What did you _do?”_ the angel demanded angrily. “Where are the rest of the reports from Prophecies and Divinations? They were right here!”

Aziraphale stiffened at the accusatory tone. “They’ve been put away.”

“They were _put_ where I was told to put them.” The angel waved angrily at the nearest piles. “But now a bunch of them are gone! Where are they?”

“They were put away in the archive, after being cataloged,” said Aziraphale, trying to be polite in spite of the other angel’s continued rudeness. “You can ask the obelisk to access the catalog, if there’s something you need to retrieve—”

“I don’t care about any catalog, I care about the missing reports!” The angel was crouched down by the nearest pile, looking at the labels on the spines and shaking their head. “All the ones I left yesterday are gone!”

Aziraphale just stared at them for a moment before slowly explaining, “Of course they’re gone, they’ve been _archived_.”

“Stop talking nonsense!” the angel sneered. “My boss said to stay away from you and I can see why. Real angels are too important to be bothered with guarding paper, let alone _archangels_, that’s why _you’re _here. Now tell me where the reports are!”

“They have been put in the _archive_. Do you even understand what that is, you blathering featherbrain?” Aziraphale snapped. “It’s a safe place to catalog and properly store _important_ documents for ease of retrieval, which _means_ not just leaving them piled up willy-nilly in hallways and unused offices until the end times!”

The angel gasped in outrage at the insult but went pale when Aziraphale said that phrase. “You not only lost them but you’ve been _reading_ them?”

Frustration and anger had Aziraphale wishing for the sword again, and with power in their voice they said, “No, of course not, don’t be silly. Can’t read a thing!” They snatched the reports from the angel’s unresisting hands when they staggered backward. “And I did not lose any of your ridiculously redundant reports, they were put away for safe keeping! Now that we have that cleared up, I’ll be getting back to work, _not reading _in the middle of a blasted _library._ Now, **Go Away,**” they ordered, shoving a bit of power at the other angel.

The angel pressed a hand to their forehead to the sudden headache that had developed there. “Oh. Right. Can’t read. Good, okay,” they mumbled, hurrying away.

Aziraphale shook their head and deposited the stack of reports on top of the nearest pile before stomping back to their office, rolling their eyes and mumbling to themself as they sat back down. “What kind of buffoon… Of course I’m _reading_ them, how else could they be cataloged? Of all the ridiculous, nonsensical nonsense-”

**Is something wrong Aziraphale? What happened?**

Aziraphale jumped when Hex spoke, realizing that they'd forgotten to deactivate the far-speaking spell. “They thought I’d lost the reports,” Aziraphale mumbled, loud enough for Hex to hear but not so loud their voice carried outside of the office. “I tried to explain that we’d put them away but they refused to listen, and they were insulting and rude, implying I’m not a real angel in some way. They didn’t even know what an archive was, they thought it had something to do with archangels. And they were shocked by the idea that I was reading the papers.”

**Oh. Well… **

“I admit I got rather snippy with them, but I was at the end of my rope. I used a bit of magic to make them leave, which probably wasn’t very nice of me, but really. I wasn’t going to waste any more time going around in circles with them. And I was rather sarcastic, told them I didn’t know how to read. I rather think they might have believed me if the lie wasn’t so blatantly obvious,” Aziraphale said with a smothered chuckle.

**I, I don’t even know what to say to that,** Hex admitted, their voice full of suppressed amusement. **If you like, I will continue to let you know when anyone enters the Library.**

“Yes, please do Hex, thank you. Hopefully I can get on with work without any more interruptions. Let’s hope the next angel at least knows what an archive is.”

**That might be asking too much.**

**∞**

Crawly sauntered into HR just a little bit after the other angels left for the day and the elementals came on shift, using that leeway to keep themself mostly out of the notice of the other angels. They nodded to the elementals as they made their way to their cube at the very darkest corner of the department where no one else sat, slipping inside and pulling up short, shocked to find a rocky lesser elemental sitting inside, a crate of gleaming golden-red apples resting on its back.

“Uhh, hi?” The elemental grunted at them and set down the crate and stepped down into the floor and vanished. “Yeah, that’s not suspicious at all.” Cautiously Crawly moved into the cube and tested the crate with their senses and with one of the spells Aziraphale had taught them before daring to pick up one of the apples, inhaling the perfectly ripe scent that had tears pricking their eyes because it smelled so much like that last apple they’d shared with Aziraphale in the Garden.

They checked the entire crate before carefully covering them with a headscarf and setting the crate down under their desk, where it would be impossible to see while Crawly was seated at the desk. They had to wonder who had risked smuggling in so many apples, and why. _Maybe it’s a prank? Maybe it’s a setup, _Crawly thought, making a face but not really surprised by the idea. Getting framed for having forbidden fruit would be exactly what you could expect from angels. Wasn’t as though the lesser elemental could tattle on who had sent it, it just did as it was told. Even a normal elemental would just do as told, if the orders came from an angel.

Crawly could barely concentrate on their work with the crate seemingly radiating illicitness at their feet, but they did their best to finish their real work, not wanting to put more of a burden on the elementals by lagging behind. By the end of the shift Crawly was a bundle of nerves but put a bored face on it, again sauntering out amidst the chatting elementals as though they didn’t have a care in the world. And if their robes seemed a little more well padded than usual, well, that wasn’t anyone’s business but their own, was it.

There were no angels harassing anyone this time and Crawly went through their routine at record speed, smiling to themself to find the lights on in HR when they returned after their ‘meal’ in the cafeteria. “Hey,” Crawly said just a touch loudly, smirking just the slightest when the three angels lurking outside of Crawly’s cube jumped. The one in the lead was a greater angel, one that Crawly vaguely recognized as also working in HR. “Need help with something?”

“We’ve had word,” said the greater angel with barely suppressed glee, “that you’ve been breaking the rules, _Crawly._”

“Yeah? Word from who?” Crawly asked, canting their head and staring pointedly at the two familiar angels lurking behind the greater angel. “People will think up the strangest things when they’ve got idle time on their hands, huh? So what rule have I broken?”

“Bringing in these!” said the greater angel, holding up the crate and whipping the headscarf off in a dramatic reveal, their triumphant grin turning to confusion as they picked up one of the lumpy reddish-gold items. “What is this?”

“It’s an apple!” said one of the angels smugly. “A whole crate of apples!”

“Actually,” said Crawly in a slow drawl, “that’s a common mistake, nothing to feel bad about. Not like anyone who hasn’t been to earth would know the difference, but you see, that’s a pomme de terre, an ‘apple of the earth’ which is not the same thing as a normal apple at all. I developed a fondness for them during my time downstairs.” They took one of the potatoes and tossed it negligently from hand to hand, piercing the three angels with a faint smirk that was not at all friendly. “You’re welcome to have one if you like. Happy to share my bounty.”

“That is very generous of you,” said the greater angel through gritted teeth, turning to look at the two confused angels with an expression that boded ill for their immediate future. “If you will pardon us, Crawly, we are required elsewhere. Keep up the good work.” The greater angel set down the crate with exaggerated care and gestured for the other two to precede them from the area, seeming to grow in height as they stalked out after them.

Crawly didn’t bother to smother the low satisfied laugh that escaped when the first bellow echoed back into the room as the three angels stepped out of the HR department. They waited until the sounds moved away before hiding themself and hurrying to the nook to divest themself of their very uncomfortable but delicious bounty of apples as they awaited Aziraphale.

**∞**

It was close to the end of the day when the splinter lit up again but before Aziraphale could answer there was a loud knock at the door. Aziraphale jumped and turned to look, feeling a sense of foreboding to see a greater angel lurking in the hallway. They were frowning down towards the far end where the helpers were busy working. “Er, yes? May I help you?”

“You know those things are banned from the Archives,” sneered the greater angel, looking back towards Aziraphale and giving them a once over. “No elementals allowed.”

“Oh, but they’re not elementals,” Aziraphale corrected, disgusted by the greater angel’s blatant disdain but adopting the politely apologetic tone that usually worked to soothe away misunderstandings, “they’re actually magical constructs.”

“Oh yeah?” The greater angel eyed them disbelievingly and stepped into the office, looming over Aziraphale, who clasped their hands together tightly in their lap and looked down at the floor. “And what are those supposed constructs doing?”

“They’re helping me catalog all of the accumulated paperwork that is—”

“I just had one of my workers clock out early,” the greater angel interrupted. “Said they had a headache. Said it was from talking to you.”

Aziraphale looked up at the greater angel, not bothering to try to hide their confusion. “I don’t know how I would have caused—” They broke off mid-sentence when they realized _why_ the angel likely had a headache. _Oh, dear, maybe I was a little too forceful with my ordering._

“They said that you moved the papers they’ve been leaving here,” the greater angel said, raising their voice to talk over Aziraphale. “And what I want to know is, is that true?”

Frustration overcame remorse as Aziraphale answered. “Of course I moved them! I have no choice but to move them! They’re not safe or useful just piled up like that!” Aziraphale stood, surprised to find that they were actually slightly taller than the greater angel, and moved towards them, backing them back out into the hallway. “I am getting hundreds of papers every day from every department, not just yours. Half of them don’t even say what department they’re from, and the other half are unreadable scribbles and smears!”

The greater angel quickly regained their aplomb, scowling up at Aziraphale, ignoring everything they were saying to go back to their original line of thought. “That’s the other thing, they said you told them that you can’t read! _Lying_ to another angel-”

Aziraphale gritted their teeth together, wishing they were back in the early days of the Garden when the very few problems they’d had to deal with had been so simple to solve. Dangerous, yes, but simple, to fight the Things, compared to the complicated and still dangerous task of dealing with obtuse angels. Again with that power in their voice, only slightly more restrained this time, they said, “Yes, clearly not something I would have said out of anger or frustration, since here I am, working in the _Library_ which is primarily filled with the written word. Glad we had this little talk. I’m sure you’ve got oodles of important things to be doing, so I will let you _**go**_ and get back to doing them. And I will, again, get back to not reading all these papers still needing to be cataloged and archived. Have a lovely day.”

The greater angel blinked at them, shocked silent as Aziraphale stepped back into their office and shut the door firmly in the greater angel’s face.

Aziraphale listened at the door, only letting out the breath they’d been holding when they heard the greater angel walk away. They activated the sliver they'd sanded smooth and had taken to using as a pin in the shoulder-fold of their robe and asked, “Are they gone?”

**They’ve departed the hallway**, Hex answered. **I couldn’t help but overhear… **

“Yes, well, I wasn’t exactly quiet,” said Aziraphale, letting themself drop down onto their stool with a heavy sigh. “At least ordering them to go seems to be working.”

**I don’t know if this is any consolation but you are an angel of the Library, _the_ Angel of the Library. This is your domain. You are the authority here. That’s why you can use the spells on the obelisk.**

“Oh. I suppose that explains why ordering them works. But no one actually told me that I’m… “ _in charge, _“a guardian, of the Library.” It felt dangerous, to think of themself as being in charge. As though it made them a target, not an authority.

**No, I had a feeling that they hadn’t. But now you know.**

“Yes. I won’t let myself forget that. Let me know when the way is clear, will you?”

**Gladly. It shouldn’t be long.**

Hex’s prediction proved true and shortly Aziraphale was slipping out of their office under the safety of their illusion, careful to avoid the areas where angels tended to be as they hurried to the elemental hall and the plant-covered nook where Crawly was due to be waiting.

Their friend was wearing a wide secretive grin when Aziraphale revealed themself, hiding something behind their back. “Oh dear, that smile never bodes well,” Aziraphale said playfully, the annoyances of the day slipping away under the warmth of Crawly’s regard.

“Oh, but this time it’s not us who had to pay the price,” Crawly said slyly, revealing a bowl full to brimming with apples. That first time it had taken days to smuggle in three tiny apples that could barely be compared to the large perfectly ripe fruit in the bowl.

Aziraphale couldn’t help but gasp to see them. “Crawly!” they scolded, looking around worriedly, almost expecting trouble to come swooping over the walls. “How in the world—”

“Those jerks who’d been harassing the lesser elemental, apparently they noticed me not liking what they were doing,” said Crawly, setting down the bowl and selecting an apple to cut into slices. “So they decided to teach me a lesson and dragged a greater angel into the plot.”

“Wait, are you saying they were trying to frame you for, for-”

Crawly nodded, taking a bite from one of the slices and closing their eyes to savor it the way Aziraphale did for everything they ate. “Blessed are the arseholes,” they said reverently, offering a slice to Aziraphale. “I wonder what it cost them to get these. Can’t have been cheap.”

“By all that’s holy,” said Aziraphale, clearly in prayer as they chewed and swallowed their bite. “It tastes like...” They cleared their throat and ate another bite. “So how is it you escaped punishment while getting to keep your ill-gotten goods?” Aziraphale asked, feeling a tiny wicked thrill when Crawly chuckled and patted the stack of apples.

“Oh well, you see, I owe it all to our old, dear, beloved friend, the humble potato,” Crawly said, grinning widely when Aziraphale snorted out a laugh, pulling out a very lumpy potato from a pocket on their robe and setting it at the top of the pile of apples. “See, the apples got delivered this morning, but they didn’t try to ‘catch’ me with them until after I’d left for the day. Clearly they hadn’t a clue about the fact that that would’ve been plenty of time to eat all of the evidence, even if I wasn’t one to share.”

“Social eaters,” Aziraphale said with a sad shake of their head, savoring another slice of apple. “So you enchanted them look like potatoes?”

“Oh no, too easy to get caught that way. I stuffed all the apples in my robes and miracled up a couple of potatoes every hour to slowly take their place. Didn’t want to draw attention by miracling up too many at once. Not very comfortable working that way but I couldn’t risk hiding them in my cubicle or my room, and no way in heaven I was going to waste them by vanishing them. Figured whoever came to catch me wouldn’t notice a change in my appearance, not with everyone still sorting out how they want to look.”

“You are the wiliest of the wily,” said Aziraphale proudly.

“Thank you, angel. So what have you been up to today?”

Not even the apples could entirely soothe away the earlier annoyance. “Angels who don’t know what an archive is,” Aziraphale growled, gratefully accepting the cup of tea Crowley offered them. Aziraphale recounted the two interactions, grinning when Crawly broke into smothered laughter. “Seems some of your sarcasm has rubbed off on me, at least when I’m annoyed enough. But really, the way they both spoke to me, I wasn’t in the mood for any of it.”

“Good,” said Crawly. “Hex isn’t the only one who deserves better.” They reached across the blanket and slipped their hand into Aziraphale’s, giving it a gentle squeeze.

“Thank you, my dear.” Aziraphale let out a reluctant sigh. “I hate to admit it. Feels like I’m asking for trouble, but I do enjoy it there. Honestly, with the helpers, er, helping, being in the Library is actually… good. A little lonely but good.”

“Well, if nothing else I could always come and teach you how to read,” they teased, grinning when Aziraphale laughed.

“I’d like that. I mean, if you’re going to have me come help you research earthly things, for the best if I know how to read I suppose.”

“Nah,” joked Crawly. “As long as you can write a report, that’s all you really need to know.”

Aziraphale smothered another laugh. “Oh yes, of course, how silly of me. Thank you for clarifying that.”

“Anytime, angel.” Crawly grinned. “Anytime.”


	7. Slipping And Slithering Vaguely Downwards

The next morning, Crawly put the last step of their big plan into action, the one they hoped would get the two of them back on Earth for at least a little while. It had taken weeks of making notes on half finished reports about a lack of data, of dropping hints about needing to do ‘first hand research’ and most recently forging a set of messages in the Slabs demanding more information about the dangers on Earth because someone had almost been discorporated by a potato.

Crawly was finally called to Dagon’s office a few days later, the archangel actually staying later than the other angels to talk to them as they came on shift. Crawly was a mess of nerves barely contained inside a carefully casual saunter. “You wanted to see me, Archangel Dagon?” Crawly asked, looking around the office in interest. Dagon had been out of the office for a little while and word had it they and another archangel had been sent down to Earth.

The S.M.I.T.E. poster had been finished and hung up, as well as other equally terrible bits of signage that did nothing to brighten the gloomy gray walls. Dagon was reading a scroll at their pristinely neat gray desk, that was only that way because they never did any actual work, all of it having been ‘delegated’ down the line to the other angels and from there to the Elementals.

“Ah, yes, _Crawly,_” Dagon said with a slight sneer, more out of habit than with any real feeling, carefully rolling up the scroll and setting it down in the center of their desk, revealing the very shiny official seal from the Council of Heaven on it. “Am I recalling correctly that you were assigned to Earth during the Garden phase?”

“Yup. That’s right,” they corrected themself when Dagon frowned at their flippant tone. “Spent so much time down there I pretty much forgot everything from before then,” they said casually, watching Dagon’s expression. It shifted subtly, losing some of the pinched look that told Crawly that Dagon, like a number of the other archangels, had known them before they’d been incorporated in the Garden, and now that they needed something from Crawly, they were afraid of just how much they actually remembered from ‘before’. Unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on how Crawly was feeling at the moment, they couldn’t remember much of anything beyond some vague unpleasant feelings and memories that skittered away when they tried to recall anything but the most surface of details.

“Yes, right, well, I’ve had quite a few recommendations that you be commended for your very detailed reports.” They frowned back down at the scroll. “About the dangers of Earth.”

“Oh, well, just happy to share what I know,” said Crawly, waving away the idea of a commendation. “Only wish I knew more. But after everything, ‘snot likely I’ll be sent back down any time soon. Don’t blame them ‘course, I’m just grateful I can help others not make the same mistakes I made. The animals, whoo, terrible, right? And don’t get me started on gravity!”

Dagon was looking down at their desk, shuffling a few papers around that gleaming seal and the scroll it was affixed to. They shuddered. “Yes, gravity. I only skimmed the first part of the manual you wrote on that. Er, what about the animals? You haven’t finished your reports on animals.” They gestured, miracling up a boxy gray chair and gesturing for Crawly to sit.

Crawly sprawled themself on it and explained, “Oh, well, they bite, for one. That can make you sick, or even discorporate you. Some of them think this form is very tasty.”

“What?” said Dagon with an expression of disbelief. “Not all of them, surely?”

“Oh, no, but the ones that don’t want to bite or eat you generally think you want to bite or eat _them_, so they’ll try to run you over or stab you with their horns or tusks. Learned that the hard way. Or they’ll poo on you, or worse.”

“Worse than _poo_?” Dagon said, face going green as Crawly went into excruciating detail about just how awful interacting with animals could be. “Enough, enough!” Dagon ordered, giving Crawly a suspicious look, but Crawly was feeling quite confident now and just shrugged.

“Just telling it like it is. A lot of them are cute*, which the humans seemed to think made up for everything else.” (*This is a direct translation from the Celestial language, which explains why Celestials ended up interacting with corporeal lifeforms in the first place.)

Dagon made an even more disgusted face and shook their head. “Yes, _humans._ Can you tell me more about what they’re like?”

“Can’t. Don’t really know. Only met the two and they weren’t exactly normal, if you know what I mean. Uhh, I understand there’s villages and towns and cities just full of ‘em down there.” Dagon gave another look at that seal and scroll and back up at Crawly, who gave a little shrug that said, _love to help but it’s out of my hands_. When the silence began to draw out Crawly slowly pushed themself to their feet and said, “If there’s nothing else, I should probably get to work, Archangel Dagon. Let me know if—”

Dagon snatched up the scroll and hurried around the desk to block Crawly from leaving. “You know, after a lot of careful consideration, I and the others have decided that there needs to be more, er, direct observation of the humans and the other things going on down on Earth.”

“Really,” drawled Crawly, who had coincidentally been suggesting the same thing for months. “I can see how that might prove helpful. Excellent idea, your archness.”

They gave Crawly another suspicious look but their politely interested expression didn’t shift in the slightest and Dagon let out a disgusted sigh. “The Council decided to send Michael and me down there, to observe and, er, ‘blend in’, Gabriel said.”

Crawly blinked, momentarily derailed by the idea of any of the archangels attempting to ‘blend in’ among other angels, let alone among humans. Even Aziraphale and Crawly had had trouble pulling it off with humans and they’d _wanted_ to be where they were. “Oh?”

“It was a disaster! The humans all ran away from us, then other humans came and tried to banish us with fire and ended up burning the houses down, which took a long time considering they were made out of mud, which doesn’t seem to burn very readily, and it smelled terrible...”

“They’re not just made out of mud,” said Crawly quietly, trying very very hard to not let any of their laughter out. “Just doing the best they can with what they’ve got, of course,” they said, shrugging again when Dagon stared at them in open-mouthed horror.

“Right, well… Crawly, you’ve proven to be a great asset to us here in Heavenly Resources so it is with great pride that I bestow upon you this once in an eternity promotion to be the acting head of the newly created Department of Earthly Observation. Effective immediately.” They slapped the scroll into Crawly’s hand and all but shoved them out the door. “You’ll be given an office and a budget and whatnot, Slate will set it all up for you. Congratulations!” Barely a blink later Dagon scuttled out of their office and out of the department entirely, a little note on their door saying they were out indefinitely on personal leave.

Crawly unrolled the scroll and quickly skimmed it but then rereading it much more carefully when the wording caught their attention, unable to keep a faint triumphant smile from pulling their lips upwards. “Hey Slate, how would you feel about a new job?”

**∞**

Aziraphale sighed heavily when the splinter from Hex began to glow for the fourth time since they’d arrived that morning. “Another angel?” they asked wearily. Since they’d sent off the greater angel a few days earlier, more and more department supervisors had been showing up to ‘check up’ on their paperwork. Some had been reasonable once Aziraphale explained the purpose of the Archives and how everything was still accessible if not so directly as a mountainous pile left precariously in the middle of a hallway. Others took affront and were sent off in much the same way as the first one, after having similarly circular arguments.

And there was a disturbing new development that Aziraphale didn’t quite know how to deal with, because many of them seemed to truly believe that Aziraphale couldn’t read. Those earlier angels had _believed_ Aziraphale’s empowered words in spite of all evidence to the contrary, and when Aziraphale had tested it on the next testy angel, they believed it too. A little more cautious testing made them realize they weren’t making the angels believe the lie, they were making it so the angels couldn’t sense that it was a lie, so they assumed it had to be true. Which had to be the least angelic power Aziraphale had ever heard of, ever.

**Yes. They’re carrying a box. They, oh. Nevermind, they… are not bringing things to be archived, I have been informed. My apologies. **

Aziraphale frowned at that but decided to ignore it. The door was currently closed against further interruptions and they were trying to work through a document that appeared to have been written by a beetle dipped in ink and left to scuttle about on a scroll.

It was a few hours later that Aziraphale finished deciphering the scroll and realizing that they had been hearing voices out in the hallway for a while, cautiously stuck their head out to see what was going on.

They blinked to see Elementals moving furniture into one of the recently emptied offices on the other side of the hallway from Aziraphale’s office. “Um, excuse me? Hello,” Aziraphale said, giving the nearest Elemental an apologetic smile when they stopped to look in their direction. “I, er, I’m Aziraphale, I work here, in the Archives.” They gestured to their office and offered a hesitant smile to the very large rocky Elemental.

“Slate,” the Elemental replied, giving them a nod of greeting and a faint smile of recognition of their name. “Honor to meet you, Aziraphale.”

Aziraphale knew that there could be dozens of Elementals who had adopted the angelicized name of ‘Slate’ but it seemed an unlikely coincidence that Crawly would mention working with one and then another one mysteriously shows up in the Library a few days later. “Oh, er, Slate, thank you. Slate, could you tell me what’s going on? I mean, I don’t want to be rude but, er, you, uh, you probably shouldn’t be in here? I’m dreadfully sorry-”

“You’ll have to talk to the boss about that,” shrugged the Elemental, pointing a thumb over their shoulder towards the main rotunda of the Library.

“The boss?” Aziraphale echoed. Slate nodded and grinned and Aziraphale slipped around the busy Elementals out into the open area, startled to find even more Elementals staging things to be moved into the offices. They turned towards the obelisk and almost walked into the angel who was supervising everything, checking things off on a shiny new slimline Slablet.

“Slate—” The red-haired, yellow-eyed angel stopped to stare at Aziraphale, clearly confused. “Well, you’re definitely not Slate. Sorry, give me a moment— Hey, Slate, has my furniture arrived? The stuff they had in there, ugh, seriously.”

“Right here, boss,” said Slate, waving another set of Elementals down the hall, one carrying a large ornate chair and a pair carrying the matching desk.

“Thanks, that’s the last thing we were waiting on. Get yourself and the others all set up then take the rest of the day, alright? We’ll start at the usual time, so everyone’s schedule stays the same, yeah?”

Slate nodded, giving the silently watching Aziraphale a polite nod before turning back to supervising the other Elementals as they continued to move furniture into the other offices.

“Sorry about that,” said Crawly, leaning against the wall, out of the way of the Elementals and crossing their arms, the tiniest of smirks pulling up the corner of their mouth as Aziraphale’s eyes crinkled even as their frown deepened. “You know how it is, setting up a new office and everything. Always a disaster.”

“New office,” Aziraphale echoed faintly. “Right.”

“You might not remember me, we met a while ago, I brought you a bunch of manuals and things? No? Oh, well, anyway, I’m Crawly.” They gave a little wave. “You’re the Librarian, right?”

“I’m Aziraphale. Uh, yes I suppose so, I mean, I do work, er, in the Archives anyway,” Aziraphale corrected, wondering what Crawly was up to. They’d known of Crawly’s plans, in the broadest of senses anyway, but showing up in the Library and taking over offices right next door was more than Aziraphale had ever imagined happening. And moving in Elementals when everyone knew they were forbidden from the Archives…

“But that’s not actually true though, is it?” said Crawly lightly, gesturing at the hallway and the offices lining it. “That certainly isn’t an archive. That’s just a hallway and big ol’ empty offices,” Crawly grinned. “I mean, ‘snot like anyone with even a bit of sense would actually store _important documents_ in the middle of a hallway. Or piled up on the floor in an empty office.”

Aziraphale was struggling to keep their frown in place. “You wouldn’t think so.”

“And ‘snot like anyone was using them. Just been sitting empty, right?”

“At least they were as of a few hours ago,” Aziraphale murmured under their breath, turning to watch the Elementals move a Slab down the hallway and into one of the larger offices which appeared to belong to Slate. “I certainly don’t have a need for them, since it’s just me working here.” _Not anymore anyway, now that the helpers have gotten the disaster under control and the Archives are finally in order._

“Right, well, we need a base of operations to work from and you know, apparently all the other departments are just full up? You wouldn’t think that was possible in a non-corporeal plane but apparently it is,” smirked Crawly. “Thankfully Slate noticed that these offices weren’t allocated to anyone else.”

“Ah,” said Aziraphale. From the corner of their eye they could see the occasional angel peek into the rotunda and quickly retreat in the face of all the Elementals working to move all the furniture into their offices. Biting their lips as they gathered themself, they turned back to Crawly and warned, “Well, Crawly, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but I feel that I must warn you that some of the other angels might not be very happy about this.” They canted their head towards the main entrance where a greater angel had pulled up short upon seeing all the Elementals and stood glowering. “They might, in fact, be rather perturbed by this turn of events. There will most likely be yelling.”

“Oh, you just leave them to me and I’ll see that it gets sorted out,” said Crawly with a sneer. “We’ll do our best to see you’re not disturbed from your work.”

“Speaking of work, what exactly is it that you’ll be doing?” asked Aziraphale, honestly curious. “You haven’t actually said, you know.”

They were interrupted by a greater angel who ignored Crawly to demand of Aziraphale, “What are all these _things_ doing here?”

“Have you never seen furniture before?” Aziraphale asked without missing a beat. “Well-”

“Not the _furniture_ you-”

“We’re the brand new Department of Earthly Observation, created by the Council of Heaven and run under the supervision of Archangel Michael and Archangel Dagon,” Crawly announced in a carrying tone that echoed throughout the Library. “They’re going to be sending angels down to Earth the minute we get our first volunteers,” they grinned. “Real eager for volunteers. What did you say your name was?”

The greater angel reared back from Crawly, giving them a once over. “I’m Greater Angel Jacob, furnishing department supervisor. Who are you? Where did you get all this from? You don’t have the authority—”

“Acting Head of the Department of Earthly Observation, at your service,” Crawly said. They reached into a fold of their robe and pulled out the scroll with its shiny official seal on it and unrolled it. “And I do indeed have the authority. You see, this says, ‘By order of the Council of Heaven, it is so commissioned that the bearer of this scroll is empowered to garner _whatsoever they shall need_ to enable delegations of the Heavenly Host to safely and properly venture forth into the physical world below,’ meaning Earth, obviously, ‘to collect data to ensure the continued safety of those messengers who are sent to deliver the word of the Almighty to those of the Earthly plane.’” Crawly carefully rolled the scroll back up, making a show of sizing up the greater angel, who looked as though they had heard some of the grislier stories that had been going around about what it was like down on Earth. “If you’re not here to volunteer, real shame too, why are you here?”

“I, er, I was sent to check the Archives,” they said weakly.

“The actual Archives are secured and direct physical access is not allowed to anyone without a writ from the Council of Heaven,” Aziraphale answered honestly, if wearily, for the nth time. “If there is something you need to review, the obelisk can assist you in using one of the Secured Archival Slabs on the second floor.”

“But..?” They gestured to the hallway where the Elementals were moving the last of the furniture into the offices.

“Those are just offices. There are no prohibitions on who may use the Library or the offices here,” Crawly said with an edge to their voice. “But feel free to take it up with the Council of Heaven if you’d like to lodge a complaint,” they added. “I’m sure Archangel Michael would be especially pleased to hear from you.”

They both watched as the greater angel hastily retreated from the Library, sharing a look and hastily looking away before their amusement could become obvious.

“Hey boss, we’re mostly done,” said Slate, waving them both closer. “Want to do a walk through before we finalize everything?”

“Be right there,” said Crawly, giving Aziraphale a quick smile. “Would you like the grand tour?”

Aziraphale nodded and trailed behind Crawly as they moved towards their offices, noticing the Elementals gathering as they said their good nights, clearly in no hurry to depart as they lingered around their offices or meandered out to the rotunda in pairs and small groups, talking lowly among themselves.

The first thing Aziraphale noticed were that the first two doors in the hallway had been changed, one labeled ARCHIVAL CATALOGING ROOM and filled with shelves and a few of the helpers sorting through the most recent papers, and the other one labeled merely ‘Archivist At Work, Do Not Disturb’ and Aziraphale tried the doorknob only to have their hand pass through the illusion. They threw an amused look at Crawly who smirked as an Elemental wafted by and plastered a sign on the wall beside the door. It read, ‘All items to be archived are to be left in the ARCHIVAL CATALOGING ROOM across the hall. All inquiries for retrieval from the Archive shall be addressed by the obelisk in the Library.’

A wall with a large wooden door had been installed in the hallway just beyond the two front rooms, emblazoned with ‘Department Of Earthly Observation’ in big black letters gilded in gold. Crawly gave them an elaborate bow. “After you.”

Aziraphale pushed open the door and stepped through, Crawly on their heels. They couldn’t help but smile to see all the offices labeled with little bronze plaques displaying the Elementals’ names and subdivisions, the previously disastrously paper-filled rooms now filled with furniture and personal affects, more than a few Elementals still there putting the finishing touches on their new shared spaces. Aziraphale’s office was untouched, but a little plaque had been put on the door that read, ‘Aziraphale, Angel of the Library, Angel of the Eastern Gate (Ret.).’

Crawly grinned at the look Aziraphale gave them, blushing when the blond angel caught them in a tight hug. “Angel,” they scolded, but they hugged Aziraphale back for a moment before stepping away. “Ahem, so, yeah, ‘fraid you’ll have to get used to us being in your space but we’ll do our best to be good neighbors. Right, everyone?”

“Yes boss!” the remaining Elementals called, all of them grinning to one another as they finished up their work and left them alone behind the big heavy DEO door.

“How?” Aziraphale whispered, staring about them in amazement when the Elementals were all gone. They pulled Crawly into their office and shut the door, triggering all the anti-spying spells. “Tell me everything!” they demanded.

“It fell into my lap, angel,” Crawly laughed, leaning back against the door. They passed them the scroll to read and told them about the meeting with Dagon. “Now we just have to figure out how to get you reassigned and we’ll be on our way back!”

Aziraphale passed the scroll back and sighed wistfully at the idea, resting their elbow on their cluttered desk and gazing fondly at Crawly, chin in hand. “That sounds lovely. I’ve been finding myself missing the Things every time some pompous greater angel comes to bother me, can you imagine?” they admitted, smiling when Crawly snorted. “Didn’t have to worry about politics with them, didn’t have to worry about who they’d tattle to if they decided I wasn’t being respectful enough to their authority. It’s… it’s exhausting.”

“I know,” murmured Crawly, some of the amusement slipping away as they stepped closer and gently rubbed their hand over Aziraphale’s hunched shoulder. “Let’s get you out of here. Some tea and potatoes will cheer you up,” they teased, smiling when Aziraphale chuckled. “I’ve been told by Acrylamide, my contact in the cafeteria, that they can actually taste good, but you have to _cook_ them.”

Aziraphale laughed again, letting Crawly help them up. “Tsk, of course! That make so much more sense.” They followed Crawly back out into the hallway, beaming at the transformation that had accomplished in so little time. “You really are a wonder, my dear.”

Crawly flushed at the compliment, bumping shoulders with Aziraphale. “Thanks, angel.”

**∞**

A few weeks later Aziraphale arrived at the Library at their usual time, long before Crawly and the Elementals would come on shift, shocked to find the great doors pulled open. Every step closer brought with it a sense of foreboding like they had never felt before.

Part of them wanted to stay hidden, more so part of them wanted to run, but they knew there was nowhere to run to, so they squared their shoulders as they had seen Crawly so often do, dropped their illusion and walked sedately through the doors.

What they saw on the other side, once their eyes adjusted to the lower levels of light, was bewildering to say the least. There were hundreds of angels and greater angels milling about, speaking in low anxious murmurs with the occasional outburst of louder conversation that was quickly hushed. Standing beneath the twinkling obelisk were the six prime members of the High Council of Heaven, arrayed in their corporeal seemings sans wings. With them was a greater fire Elemental who was shaking their head in the negative while Gabriel gestured at the obelisk.

Aziraphale hurried up the clear path from the doors, relieved when the greater fire Elemental was waved off by Gabriel and left. Ignoring the waves of whispers that followed in their wake Aziraphale put on their biggest smile as they stepped up in front of the tableau everyone was watching. “Er, hello-”

“Here is the angel of the hour now!” Gabriel held out their hands towards Aziraphale, taking their hand to shake it when they just stared in bewilderment. The five other prime members of the Council of Heaven converged, all of them shaking Aziraphale’s hand in turn, giving jolly thumps on the shoulder and mumbling inane encouragements before withdrawing when Gabriel stepped forward again.

“I’m sorry but-”

Gabriel turned Aziraphale to face the gathered angels and announced, “The High Council of Heaven has gathered everyone together to honor Aziraphale, for excellent work in the Archives! Hear hear!”

Sandalphon led them in a rousing round of applause, though Aziraphale could see sneers and smirks on a few of the faces of the gathered angels. “We have an official commendation for you, for persevering in the face of great adversity. We’re very proud of you.”

Aziraphale had no choice but to allow Raphael to tie the ribbon around their neck and stand through another round of applause. The archangels were watching them closely, clearly looking for signs of something under Aziraphale’s honest confusion. “Honorable Council-members, I’m very, uh, honored, but I really don’t understand. I’m just doing the job I was assigned to do. Why—”

“You really should have told us,” said Uriel in a confidential tone that carried across the entire rotunda and out into the open area outside the great doors. “There’s no shame in ignorance, Aziraphale. The humbly created are all ignorant of something at some time.”

“Okay,” said Aziraphale dazedly, staring at them with a dawning sense of horror that they did their best to hide, feeling lightheaded when they realized what was really going on. Gabriel and the Council were trying to catch them in a lie, trying to humiliate and discredit them in front of as many of their peers as was possible to cram into the Library. _But why? What did I do to deserve this? _They looked from face to face and said faintly, “I freely admit, I am quite humbly ignorant. I still don’t understand what this is really about?”

“Look at how modest! Really, Aziraphale, I should think it was obvious! You _somehow, _singlehandedly, in spite of all the obstacles put before you, brought the Archives from a useless, neglected disaster into a fine upstanding institution. And it’s only just today been brought to our attention that you did all this while _not being able to read! _That is truly a feat worthy of celebration!” Michael said, giving a few condescending claps while the Council members looked on with toothy smiles and the gathered angels shifted and began murmuring in shock and surprise. But a few moved closer in anticipation.

“Which is why we’re promoting you, effective immediately, to the recently created Department of Earthly Observation.” Gabriel leaned out to stage whisper over the applause, “No reading required.”

“Ah,” Aziraphale said as a few of the gathered angels laughed weakly at the joke. Of course they’d threaten remove Aziraphale from their job just when it was starting to feel satisfying. Just when they’d begun to gain the trust of some of their fellow angels. And even if they gave back the medal they’d been forced to publicly accept, even if they admitted to the sarcasm that had been magically masked as truth, there would be no going back; the trust and goodwill they’d gained would be lost and they’d be forever known only for _that_, no matter how many other things they might do. Aziraphale looked down at the shiny golden medallion on a pale blue ribbon and stammered, “And if I, er, when I end up knowing, learning, how to read? Can I return to the Library?”

The Council exchanged speaking looks full of satisfaction and poorly veiled smugness, sure that Aziraphale had just walked right into their trap and Gabriel adopted a conciliatory expression that did nothing to hide the condescension and disdain they felt. “We all have our proper places within the Host of course, and you, Aziraphale, are surely meant to be in the Library, to have accomplished so much with so very little,” said Gabriel, leaning close, certainly close enough to detect a lie if Aziraphale told one.

Buried beneath the fear that felt like an iceberg in the pit of their stomach, of what would happen if word got out about the odd monstrous power that had gotten them into this mess to begin with, was an ember of fury that was getting close to becoming an inferno. _Angels are supposed to do good, supposed to **be** good! And instead, here are the leaders of Heaven itself going out of their way to be petty and cruel. _

Gabriel’s voice was barely above a whisper as they scolded, “Your ridiculous little sob story certainly hasn’t won you any friends, Aziraphale. But if you’ll just admit it, that you broke the rules and recruited Elementals to do the work for you, that things got out of hand and you ended up in over your head... Admit it and we’ll let you scurry back to where you belong and we’ll all just forget any of this ever happened.”

Aziraphale inhaled slowly, not afraid that the fire would go out but that it would burn too brightly and they lifted their head to give Gabriel and the other archangels their most beaming of smiles. In a voice that cut through the growing chatter like the searing edge of a bronze sword wreathed in flames, they said, “You’re right Gabriel. I _have_ reached my limit, and it’s a relief to finally be able to set this burden down. It’s been a terrible trial, dealing with all that unreadable paperwork alone, without another living soul to help. But as you said, there is no shame to be had among the Host, so I most gratefully accept your generous offer of a promotion as well as the promise of returning to my beloved Library one day.”

Aziraphale was certainly close enough to see the confusion cross Gabriel’s face when they realized that they didn’t, couldn’t sense any lies. Could see it spread outward among the archangels when Gabriel didn’t denounce them in some dramatic and humiliating way. Could hear it in their voices as they made their excuses and departed, followed out by a very confused array of angels who barely spared Aziraphale a glance as they left.

And Aziraphale kept on smiling until they were in the safety of their shielded office, unsurprised to find Crawly waiting for them with open arms, and they rested their head on their best friend’s shoulder and cried until they could cry no more. When they tried to free themself from the too-tightly tied ribbon Crawly summoned the obsidian knife and cut them free, and Aziraphale vanished the medal and fraying ribbon with a snarl.

“That really wasn’t how I wanted things to go,” Crawly confessed once the tears subsided, rubbing their hand soothingly over Aziraphale’s back. “I’m so sorry-”

“No,” said Aziraphale in a hoarse whisper. “Not your fault. I don’t know what I did to earn their continued animosity but they accused me of breaking the rules and using Elementals to run things, as though I have something nefarious to gain by doing the work they set me to do.” Aziraphale couldn’t bring themself to bring up their power, to admit to their best friend that they had discovered by accident that they could conceal their lies with magic. It was too shameful, too unangelic, too close to proving that all the mistreatment was deserved.

“Oh. It’s like the Garden all over again.” Crawly let out a heavy sigh. “I’m still sorry. I know you’re happy working here. If I’d left you alone, if I hadn’t meddled—”

“If you hadn’t meddled, I’d be miserable and alone and lost, instead of with my best friend,” Aziraphale said quietly, letting Crawly lean back so they could look at their face and see the heartfelt truth there. “I’ll miss the Library, but I missed you far more.”

Crawly blinked hard against the tears that welled and pulled Aziraphale back into a tight hug. “No fair, saying stuff like that,” they chided, sniffing and wiping at their eyes when Aziraphale chuckled. “I’m supposed to be comforting you, not crying on you.”

“I don’t mind,” Aziraphale said, smiling when Crawly gave them a look. “You being here when I needed you was just what I needed.”

“Always,” Crawly said. “And you’ll still be here when we’re not down there. We’ve got a lots of ideas, the Elementals and me. It’s going to work out, angel.”

“It has,” said Aziraphale, letting out a slow breath and giving them a true smile. “Somehow, it has. So, what do we do first?”

Crawly grinned. “First, we celebrate. And then we get to work.”


End file.
